Accurate control of a quantum system is complicated to achieve partly due to the system being coupled to its surrounding environment. The coupling induces dissipation and decoherence not only destroying the coherent quantum state but making the application of control unpredictable. When the control results from manipulation of external fields, it is usually referred to as driving and its joint effect with decoherence constitutes an active field of study in reduced-density-operator theory. Recently, this field has been pushed forward by its necessity in simulating Cooper pair pumping where the geometric nature of quantum evolution allows for controlled transport of charge carriers in superconducting circuits. Such circuits themselves are under constant investigation as they grant access to fundamental quantum phenomena and facilitate promising applications such as those in quantum information processing.\nIn this dissertation, driven quantum systems under decoherence are investigated. Extensions and improvements to a recent master equation for nearly adiabatic driving are presented and analyzed. The emergent properties in quantum evolution are studied both analytically and numerically. Related to the findings, a general conservation law of operator current is derived and used to explain observed nonconservation in previous theoretical studies. The derived theory is applied to Cooper-pair pumping and shown to lead to important properties such as superadiabatic ground-state pumping. A recent pumping experiment is simulated and the breakdown point for ideal pumping is found with feasible physical parameters. A study of charge transport in the presence of flux noise is presented leading to detectable dissipative currents and the typical description of the device used for pumping is extended to include a nonvanishing loop inductance.\nA novel approach to implement control of quantum systems is proposed based on constructing a tunable coupling to an artificial environment using either a coplanar waveguide cavity or coupled quantum LC resonators. Tunability allowing for both efficient initialization and protected evolution is theoretically demonstrated. Finally, a general framework for quantum driving is constructed without the typical assumption of a classical driving force leading to peculiar results.\nThis dissertation presents original research on both modeling the control of open quantum systems as well as the realization of such control. The work simulates physical phenomena in superconducting circuits and makes predictions for future experiments. In addition, it introduces novel theoretical tools and approaches that advance the state of the art.
Accurate control of a quantum system is complicated to achieve partly due to the system being coupled to its surrounding environment. The coupling induces dissipation and decoherence not only destroying the coherent quantum state but making the application of control unpredictable. When the control results from manipulation of external fields, it is usually referred to as driving and its joint effect with decoherence constitutes an active field of study in reduced-density-operator theory. Recently, this field has been pushed forward by its necessity in simulating Cooper pair pumping where the geometric nature of quantum evolution allows for controlled transport of charge carriers in superconducting circuits. Such circuits themselves are under constant investigation as they grant access to fundamental quantum phenomena and facilitate promising applications such as those in quantum information processing.\nIn this dissertation, driven quantum systems under decoherence are investigated. Extensions and improvements to a recent master equation for nearly adiabatic driving are presented and analyzed. The emergent properties in quantum evolution are studied both analytically and numerically. Related to the findings, a general conservation law of operator current is derived and used to explain observed nonconservation in previous theoretical studies. The derived theory is applied to Cooper-pair pumping and shown to lead to important properties such as superadiabatic ground-state pumping. A recent pumping experiment is simulated and the breakdown point for ideal pumping is found with feasible physical parameters. A study of charge transport in the presence of flux noise is presented leading to detectable dissipative currents and the typical description of the device used for pumping is extended to include a nonvanishing loop inductance.\nA novel approach to implement control of quantum systems is proposed based on constructing a tunable coupling to an artificial environment using either a coplanar waveguide cavity or coupled quantum LC resonators. Tunability allowing for both efficient initialization and protected evolution is theoretically demonstrated. Finally, a general framework for quantum driving is constructed without the typical assumption of a classical driving force leading to peculiar results.\nThis dissertation presents original research on both modeling the control of open quantum systems as well as the realization of such control. The work simulates physical phenomena in superconducting circuits and makes predictions for future experiments. In addition, it introduces novel theoretical tools and approaches that advance the state of the art.
One of the challenges of adiabatic control theory is the proper inclusion of the effects of dissipation. Here we study the adiabatic dynamics of an open two-level quantum system deriving a generalized master equation to consistently account for the combined action of the driving and dissipation. We demonstrate that in the zero-temperature limit the ground state dynamics is not affected by environment. As an example, we apply our theory to Cooper pair pumping, which demonstrates the robustness of ground state adiabatic evolution.
We study the effect of Markovian environmental noise on the dynamics of a two-level quantum system which is steered adiabatically by an external driving field. We express the master equation taking consistently into account all the contributions to the lowest nonvanishing order in the coupling to the Markovian environment. We study the master equation numerically and analytically and we find that, in the adiabatic limit, a zero-temperature environment does not affect the ground-state evolution. As a physical application, we discuss extensively how the environment affects Cooper-pair pumping. The adiabatic ground-state pumping appears to be robust against environmental noise. In fact, the relaxation due to the environment is required to avoid the accumulation of small errors from each pumping cycle. We show that neglecting the nonsecular terms in the master equation leads to unphysical results, such as charge nonconservation. We discuss also a possible way to control the environmental noise in a realistic physical setup and its influence on the pumping process.
Ever since Peter Shor's ground-breaking discovery in 1994 of an algorithm capable of factoring large integers on a quantum-mechanical computer exponentially faster than using any known classical method, research on quantum computing has boomed. Quantum information – a unique mixture of computer science, physics and mathematics – has developed into a new branch of information theory. On the experimental side, physicists from many different disciplines including atomic, solid-state and low-temperature physics, as well as optics, are striving today towards a practical quantum computer. All the candidate quantum bit (qubit) technologies have one thing in common: They rely on the controlled time-evolution of a closed quantum system, a seemingly paradoxical task.\n\nIn this Thesis the temporal control of quantum systems is studied. The topics included can be divided into two according to the type of temporal evolution; geometrical or dynamical. Geometrical realization-independent methods for quantum computing are studied first. Then the study is extended into dynamical quantum computing and the so-called Josephson charge-qubit register is considered as a test bench. Finally, a spin-off application of the geometrical evolution of a Josephson junction system is studied, i.e. Cooper pair pumping. A novel Cooper pair pump, the Cooper pair "sluice", is introduced.\n\nThe work on quantum computing reported in this Thesis is theoretical while the Cooper pair "sluice" is studied both theoretically and experimentally. Numerical simulations, both sequential and parallel, are used extensively throughout the Thesis. The experiments were carried out under cryogenic mK conditions and the sample fabrication was done using e-beam nanolithography.\n\nBecause the execution time of a quantum algorithm is always limited by the inevitable process of decoherence, it is important to utilize any measure available for accelerating quantum computations. It is found that practical quantum algorithms could greatly benefit from classical computer-aided optimization. Moreover, it is found that even a modest demonstrator of a full quantum algorithm using Josephson charge qubits is just barely realizable within present-day coherence times. However, the experimental part of this Thesis shows clear evidence of the functioning of the "sluice". While the worldwide effort of improving the coherence properties of qubits is underway, the "sluice" could well find practical use, e.g., in metrology in the foreseeable future.
Known as decoherence, the unavoidable interaction of a quantum system with its surrounding environment is usually considered to be detrimental for quantum information processing. In this thesis the coherent, open loop control of such open systems is studied. Concepts from quantum control theory and the theory of open quantum system are adopted in order to fight decoherence and implement quantum gates in a noiseless manner. In particular, Lie algebraic methods and numerical optimization tools are used to investigate the control properties of a single spin interacting with a spin environment. We show that, independent of the size of the environment, every unitary transformation can be implemented on the system spin through a single control field. We proceed by investigating dynamical decoupling, a method to suppress the interactions with the environment, for finite- and for in- finite dimensional systems. We prove that every finite dimensional system can be protected from decoherence, even if the environment is infinite dimensional, whereas for noise described by a Lindblad master equation dynamical decoupling will never succeed. This will lead to a new method to distinguish decoherence from intrinsic noise terms. We further prove that not every infinite dimensional system can be protected from decoherence through dynamical decoupling. Afterwards we investigate dynamical decoupling of systems that are described by quadratic Hamiltonians, showing that such interactions can always be suppressed with two simple operations. In the last part we investigate the coherent control of a Lindblad master equation. We show that a strong noise process exhibiting a decoherence free subspace can substantially increase the number of unitary operations that can be implemented, allowing us to fully control parts of the system. Afterwards we develop a scheme to make Hamiltonians and Lindbladians commutative by adding an auxiliary system. The old, possibly non-commutative dynamics, is recovered through a non-selective measurement.
Fast and reliable manipulation with qubits is fundamental for any quantum technology. The implementation of these manipulations in physical systems is the focus of studies involving optimal control theory. Realistic physical devices are open quantum systems. So far, studies in optimal control theory have primarily utilized the Redfield/Lindblad quantum master equation to simulate the dynamics of such systems. However, this Markov description is not always sufficient. Here, we present a study of qubit control utilizing the nonequilibrium Green's function method. We compare the traditional master equation with more general Green's function results and demonstrate that even in the parameter regime suitable for the application of the Redfield/Lindblad approach, the two methods yield drastically different results when addressing evolution involving mixed states. In particular, we find that, in addition to predicting different optimal driving profiles, a more accurate description of system evolution enables the system to reach the desired final state much more quickly. We argue that the primary reason for this is the significance of the non-Markov description of driven system dynamics due to the effect of time-dependent driving on dissipation.
All real-world quantum systems interact with their surrounding environment to some extent. No matter how weak the coupling that prevents the system from being isolated, the evolution of an open quantum system is eventually plagued by non-unitary features, such as decoherence and dissipation. Decoherence is a quantum effect where the system loses its ability to exhibit coherent behavior. Nowadays, decoherence stands as a serious obstacle in quantum information processing. As the manipulation of quantum coherence in experiments has progressed, the need to better understand, control, and utilize dissipative non-equilibrium dynamics of quantum systems has grown in importance. This has ranged from fundamental questions associated with the quantum-to-classical transition and quantum thermodynamics innovation in quantum optics and cavity/circuit quantum electrodynamics. Current studies of many-body dynamics, ultracold atoms in optical lattices, trapped ions, superconducting systems, nanoelectro-mechanical systems, and quantum fields under the influence of external conditions offer new challenges to address questions regarding quantum systems far from equilibrium. On the theoretical side, quantum trajectory-based methods could be the key to both quantum nanodevice design and exploration of new regimes of quantum mechanics and quantum measurement, as well as applications to various quantum technologies.